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André George Previn, KBE (born Andreas Ludwig Prewin; April 6, 1929) is a German-American pianist, conductor, and composer. He is considered one of the most versatile musicians in the world and is the winner of four Academy Awards for his film work and ten Grammy Awards for his recordings (and one more for his Lifetime Achievement).
Previn was born in Berlin, Germany, the son of Charlotte (née Epstein) and Jack Previn, who was a lawyer, judge, and music teacher. He is said to be "a distant relative of" the composer Gustav Mahler. However, In a pre-concert public interview at the Lincoln Center, in May 2012, Previn laughed at the suggestion that he is related to Mahler. The year of his birth is uncertain. Whilst most published reports give 1929, Previn himself has stated that 1930 is his birth year.
In 1939, his family, being Jewish, had to leave Nazi Germany and moved to Los Angeles, where his great-uncle, Charles Previn, was music director of Universal Studios. André grew up in Los Angeles and became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1943. At Previn's 1946 graduation from Beverly Hills High School he played a musical duet with Richard M. Sherman; Previn played the piano, accompanying Sherman (who played flute). He first came to prominence by arranging and composing Hollywood film scores in 1948. Coincidentally, in 1964, both composers won Oscars for different films, both winning in musical categories.
In 1951 and 1952, while stationed at Presidio of San Francisco, Previn took private conducting lessons from Pierre Monteux, which he valued highly.
In the mid-to-late 1950s, and more recently, Previn toured and recorded as a jazz pianist. In the 1950s, mainly recording for Contemporary Records, he worked with Shelly Manne, Leroy Vinnegar, Benny Carter, and others. An album he recorded with Manne and Vinnegar of songs from My Fair Lady was a best-seller (see My Fair Lady (Shelly Manne album)). As a solo jazz pianist, Previn largely devoted himself to interpreting the works of major songwriters such as Jerome Kern (recorded in 1959), Frederick Loewe, Vernon Duke (recorded in 1958), and Harold Arlen (recorded in 1960). Previn made two albums with Dinah Shore as arranger, conductor, and accompanist in 1960, and another, "Duet", with Doris Day in 1961. He made appearances on The Ford Show, Starring Tennessee Ernie Ford as well as The Dinah Shore Chevy Show. He collaborated with Julie Andrews on a collection of Christmas carols in 1966, focusing on rarely heard carols. This popular album has been reissued many times over the years and is now available on CD. His main influences as a jazz pianist include Art Tatum, Hank Jones, Oscar Peterson, and Horace Silver. Previn's more recent work also shows the influence of Bill Evans. Previn has recorded solo classical piano compositions by Mozart, Gershwin, Poulenc, Shostakovich, an album for RCA with violinist Erick Friedman of the Franck and Debussy violin sonatas, and many chamber works for piano.
In 1967, Previn succeeded John Barbirolli as music director of the Houston Symphony Orchestra. In 1968, he began his tenure as principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO), serving in that post until 1979. During his LSO tenure, he and the LSO appeared on the BBC Television programme André Previn's Music Night. From 1976 to 1984, he was music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra (PSO) and, in turn, had another television series with the PSO entitled Previn and the Pittsburgh. He was also principal conductor of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra from 1985 to 1988.
In 1985, he became music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Although Previn's tenure with the orchestra was deemed satisfactory from a professional perspective, other conductors including Kurt Sanderling, Simon Rattle, and Esa-Pekka Salonen, did a better job at selling out concerts. Previn clashed frequently with Ernest Fleischmann (the orchestra's Executive VP and General Manager), most notably when Fleischmann failed to consult him before naming Salonen as Principal Guest Conductor of the orchestra, complete with a tour of Japan. Because of Previn's objections, Salonen's title and Japanese tour were withdrawn; however, shortly thereafter, in April 1989, Previn resigned. Four months later, Salonen was named Music Director Designate of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, officially taking the post of Music Director in October 1992.
Previn has composed film scores (including many songs), jazz pieces and contemporary classical music. His earliest compositions known at least by name/type are student works from the mid-1940s (a Clarinet Sonata, a String Quartet, a Rhapsody for Violin and Orchestra and some art songs). They were written at the same time as he did his first work for the movies (1946) and his first jazz recordings (1945).
In Hollywood between 1946 and 1969, Previn also worked extensively as an adapter, winning his four Academy Awards (out of 13 nominations) for works in this category: Gigi (Original score by Frederick Loewe for the film), Porgy and Bess (stage-to-film adaptation of George Gershwins opera score), Irma la Douce (related to the music score of Marguerite Monnot, but not as a stage-to-film adaptation becoming a musical film) and My Fair Lady (stage-to-film adaptation of Fredrick Loewes musical score). While working as an adaptationer, Previn regularly modified the original compositions. At times, he was adding some own music, orchestrating, conducting and playing piano, too. So in saying that Previn worked as an adaptationer means that he was heavily involved in those films on every level of his versatile musicianship as a composer, arranger, orchestrator, conductor and pianist.
In later years, he has concentrated on composing contemporary classical music. In this field, Previn's works as a composer "combine expressionistic harmony with a strong tendency towards tonality. They are rhythmic and metrically complex, marvelously orchestrated, and include flashes of idioms associated with jazz and symphonic film music. Despite the crossover appeal that Previn's art music provokes in the ears of many commentators, Previn does not see himself as a postmodern musician, trying to mix musical styles and elements to create new kinds of aesthetic experiences." For example, he collaborated with Tom Stoppard on Every Good Boy Deserves Favour, a play with substantial musical content, which was first performed in London in 1977 with Previn conducting the LSO. His first opera, A Streetcar Named Desire, premiered at the San Francisco Opera in 1998. It quickly developed into one of the most widely played contemporary operas. His second opera, Brief Encounter, based on the 1945 movie of the same name, was premiered at Houston Grand Opera on May 1, 2009. His numerous other contemporary classical works include vocal, chamber, and orchestral music. His contemporary classical music was premiered by artists like Vladimir Ashkenazy, Janet Baker, Yuri Bashmet, Renée Fleming, Yo-Yo Ma, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Itzhak Perlman, John Williams, the Emerson String Quartet, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and the Vienna Philharmonic. The closest working relationships with regard to Previn's contemporary classical music are with violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter, having premiered six works between 2001 and 2012, and with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, having premiered (as an ensemble or with smaller groups or soloists from its ranks) nine works between 1996 and 2012.
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